Bonita Wyke

Pianist Extraordinaire...

Bonita Sonsini Wyke is a classical pianist and educator originally from Los Angeles. She's worked worked with leading vocalists, instrumentalists and musical ensembles across the US earning herself a reputation as a musician of unsurpassed sensitivity, technical skill and artistry. She has been the musical director for a wide variety of stage productions, including opera, musical theater and ballet. Bonita developed her education of and love for dance as well as the importance of the musical relationship specific to live dance performance while touring extensively with the Bella Lewinsky Dance Company for several years as the company's esteemed solo pianist.

It's been nearly 4 decades since Bonita worked with Bella Lewitsky (who was not only a revolutionary modern choreographer but also a classically trained pianist). I was honored and filled with excitement and gratitude when Bonita elected to collaborate with me. I would be the first choreographer to follow her self-defined "life changing" experience working with Bella Lewitsky. We moved forward with trust and an extremely short window of work-time together ~ only 8 days from inception to finish, including the final recording session.

Working with Bonita took me back to my many years of formal training in classical ballet and modern dance techniques. It brought back the visceral experience of the synergy I'd discovered and loved so much ~ live pianist and/or percussionist offering musical partnership in the class setting. The many years of my structured classes, full of potentially monotonous technical routines, were transformed into larger than life narratives through the spirit what only live music can provide. Later in my career, I discovered that it was the live musician and music for which I regularly showed up...not the required technical upkeep.

Wherever you may be in the world ~ when you happen upon a live musician be it on a street corner or in a symphony hall, take the time to quiet yourself and soak in what is being given to you from the soul of even a stranger. Music is the vibration of life ~ easily and clearly communicated through the Universal language of passion...